Santa
by Lily of the Shadow
Summary: Charlie explains exactly WHY Santa does not exist. Lighthearted Christmas One-shot. Happy Non-Denominational Winter Festival, everyone. [Holiday Fluff]


All calculations courtesy of www. brainofbrian .com/philosophies2.html. The idea is brought to you courtesy of myself (with some inspirtation from _(cough)_ Bernard..). and the image of chibi-Charlie and chibi-Don courtesy of a hundred throusand squealing fangirls. You know you exist, don't try to hide it...

DISCLAIMER:

Holly is Red,  
My Christmas is Blue  
Because I don't own,  
so please don't sue!

Thank you.

* * *

He had it all figured out when he was seven, exactly why Santa could never exist. It was, of course, a simple mathematical equation. 

"You see, Lady and Gentlemen," He began, pointing to a chart with several somewhat childishly drawn diagrams of a person, cookies and milk, reindeer and a sleigh, "If we begin with the basics, there is absolutely no known species of reindeer that can fly. Of course, given that there are over a quarter million species yet to be discovered, this does not _entirely_ rule out flying reindeer.

"_Assuming_ that flying reindeer could, in fact, exist," Charlie continues, pointing next to the picture of several kids, "There are two _billion_ people under the age of eighteen in the world. Since Santa does not seem to cater to the minorities, herein including the Muslim, Hindu, Jewish, Buddhist, Zen, Shinto, Atheist, and others, that reduces Santa's workload by approximately 15 per cent. Given the average census rate of three and a half children per household, that's over 98 million homes. We can assume, I believe, that there is at least one good kid in each home." He shoots Don a pointed look and then grins back at his parents winningly.

"Hey!" Don protests. "I'm a good kid!"

Charlie ignores him. "Given the logical east to west travel, and factoring in the rotation of the earth and time zones, this gives Santa about thirty-one hours to distribute his gifts. This works it out to 822.6 visits per _second_. This means that for each household that we can safely assume the he would stop at, he would have precisely one _thousandth_ of a second to park, jump down the chimney, distribute presents, eat the snacks, and return up the chimney to get to the next house.

"This leads us to the assumption that each of these houses is evenly distributed, which, for the sake of ease of calculation we will accept, and thus each household is worth .78 miles of travel. Now, together this gives us 75 and a half million miles. If we don't count rest stops, lunch stops, or naps, this gives us a speed of about 650 miles per _second_, which is over 3000 times the speed of sound. For comparison purposes, the fastest man-made vehicle on earth moves at about 27.4 miles per second." Charlie noted with a look of triumph.

"Yeah, the Ulysses _Space_ Probe." Don said, waving dismissively. His mother nudged him to stop, which he did, albeit with a smirk.

"_Anyway_. An ordinary reindeer tops out at fifteen miles an HOUR." Charlie added. "Returning to Santa himself, if he consumes one cookie and one glass of milk at each house, this adds a little over 225 calories per household. Multiplied by the numbers of houses, this gives us 2.0655 times ten to the sixth calories," He announced, scribbling out the number 20,655,000,000 on the poster behind him. "On average, one pound is 3500 calories." He adds, putting a long line under the number and underscoring it with the second. A terse equals sign follows. "This means that, in one night, Santa would gain two thousand, nine hundred fifty tons of weight."

"That's impossible." Don said, rolling his eyes.

"Exactly. If you agree with me then, I don't need to go on explaining how the rest of the equation works out that Santa does not exist." Charlie nodded.

"But you will anyway because your parents are interested in why exactly you refuse to believe that there is a Santa." Alan said, urging Charlie on. Don rolled his eyes and Charlie nodded, continuing.

"Assuming, then, that each child gets nothing more than a 2 pound, medium-sized Lego set, the sleigh is carrying 321,000 tons, not counting Santa, whom we have already determined to be well over two thousand tons himself at the end of the trip. Your run-of-the-mill Reindeer can only pull approximately 300 pounds of weight. Now assuming that these are, in fact, the flying reindeer previously mentioned, and allowing for their ability to pull ten times the normal load, you would still require 214,000 reindeer. This increases the payload, excluding sleigh, to 353,430 tons. That, for reference, is equal to four times the weight of the ocean liner Queen Elizabeth.

Now, all this weight at all this speed creates and enormous amount of air resistance. It would heat up the lead reindeer pair with 1.4 quintillion joules of energy." TO emphasize this point, he wrote out 1,400,000,000,000,000,000 on the poster underneath the reindeer. "That is for each reindeer, each second. Needless to say, nothing could withstand the force and the reindeer would therefore be incinerated almost immediately, exposing the reindeer behind them. Given this pattern, the entire team of nearly a quarter million reindeer would be completely vaporized within .00426ths of a second. Meanwhile, a conservatively estimated 250 pound Santa would be thrust back against the sleigh with a force of about four billion, three hundred fifteen thousand fifteen pounds." Charlie nodded resolutely.

"In conclusion, if there ever was a Santa, and if he ever did deliver presents, he is most certainly deceased by now, and therefore does no longer exist." Charlie gave a short bow, rolled up his poster and set it down. While their parents were clapping, Dons tuck a tongue out at Charlie, who returned the childish gesture.

"Showoff." Don muttered before getting up and helping himself to the milk and cookies on the table in front of them.


End file.
